Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Driving in Circles - (Korea) Day 254

Work call this morning was at 0600. We had to setup for a meeting in the top secret conference room. This was the only "normal" work I did for the day. The rest of the day consisted of training the augmentees. Special K and I took two vans and picked them all up at tent city at 0745.
We took 4 vans and made a convoy out to CP Tango. We had Special K driving the lead van, with me driving the 2nd van, an augmentee who already knew the way driving the 3rd, while our NCOIC drove the 4th. We made it there without any issues and I tried to show the folks in my van the various landmarks I use while navigating to and from CP Tango. When we arrived at CP Tango, we walked around the outside showing the augmentees the various portals and the helicopter pads where they will be picking up the generals and other VIPs. We then all loaded up and headed back to Yongsan where we broke for lunch.

I ate lunch in my room and was able to video chat with my wife which was nice, I wasn't sure if I would have the time or not because of our schedule. After lunch we all met up once again and made the same trip to CP Tango only this time our NCOIC did not come. We also had the augmentees drive the route while me and Special K sat in the passenger seat helping them out and answering any questions. We ended up making this round trip twice in the afternoon switching out drivers so everyone could get a feel for driving in Korean traffic and feel comfortable making the drive back and forth.

Speaking of Korean traffic…it gets so bad at times there was actually a food vendor standing in the middle of the road selling stuff. We went by quicker than I could get my iPhone out to take a photo, but it was definitely something you don't see everyday. He had on a surgical mask, I guess that was to protect him from all the exhaust fumes…lol.

We ended up losing 3 of our augmentees when we got back from the first trip after lunch. I guess they weren't screened well enough before they were assigned to us. Because they will be transporting high ranking officers and VIPs in the vehicles, they have to have at least a "secret" security clearance and these three did not. They are going to go to another unit and we will be getting three new ones tomorrow.

By the time we got back from the 2nd trip after lunch it was almost 1700, so we turned all the augmentees loose for the day. I was able to check my email in the office and quickly finish only 1 SkillPort. We then left for the night and I changed in my room and headed to the gym. After my workout I ate a snack and did the usual….TV shows and a SkillPort. I start class again next Tuesday, so the number of SkillPorts I have time to do after work is going to go down.

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